Shot Location: Jawahar Kala Kendra, Jaipur

Aesthetic Elements:

Major Reason to Shoot:

I wanted to show the Comparison between the Real world being i.e. The Pigeon Versus its Shadow, being casted right behind it.

To achieve this,

I moved to my left so that I could place the shadow on the bottom left of the frame and the Pigeon on the Top right.

This movement also helped me to place Negative Space correctly and to put both my Primary Subject ie. the Pigeon and my Secondary or Complimentary subject aka the Pigeons shadow, on the Rule of Thirds quadrant in the 3x3 Grid camera grid overlay.Hope that you enjoyed the Shot.

Minimalism as Less Elements

As you must have observed in many of my Photographs, I prefer shooting a lot from the Side. It gives a unique perspective and most importantly adds certain depth to the frame. That just doesn't happen when shooting dead front.

The above shot of the Glossy Door Handle, too has been shot from the side angle.

I moved this much this time around, to include the red area of the wall which you can see on the extreme right.

The Reason: well, Color Palette. Yes, I do balance the color palette of the frame and that influences my compositions a lot.

Shooting from the side also helped me incorporate a lot of negative space (to the right of the frame) which is another basic element of Minimalist Photography.

This shot is again one of those, where an evident subject was not available as such, and therefore I crafted my own subject via my physical movement.

Minimalism as Less Elements

This is the second shot from the same place i.e Albert Hall Jaipur, that I am posting here.

The earlier posted shot was in the landscape format.

The other difference between the two Minimalist shots is that here the Bird / Black Crow is sitting on top of the Street Lamp, whereas in the other shot, the Bird is seen flying across the Street Lamp.

Minimalism as Less Elements

Well, there is no beach in my City, Jaipur. Its just that one can pull off such shots by finding puddles of water post rains. That is exactly what I did.

I found this large puddle of water at SMS Stadium, Jaipur.

There was a lot of clutter being reflected in the puddle. I took a full 360 degree view and walked around the entire puddle to find interesting reflections.

I spotted a reflection of a Street Lamp to begin with and within in a few seconds, these two Love Birds/Pigeons Flew onto the Water Puddle.

There is an Old Zen Saying that says "When the student is ready, the master appears."

If one relates that to Photography it could mean "When the Photographer is ready, the subject appears."

Yes, indeed The Subject appeared when I was ready. It has happened with me a lot of times before.

Once I had my subject ready, I decided to shoot this in the Vertical/ Portrait mode. That helped me remove some unwanted elements from the frame. I also cropped this photograph to further reduce clutter.

Why I liked the subject despite being very common? was because these birds signify Relationship /Companionship / Love. That was the first appeal. The second was their reflection in water.

In the Minimalist Composition above, I have also left a lot of Negative Space and followed the obvious Rule of Thirds.

One important point to note is that, here we have 3 shades or 3 tones of color i.e Light / Medium / Dark. That really pops a Black and White Photograph.

The same principle is followed in Pencil Shading.

The 3 Light/ Medium and Dark tones are the basics of Pencil Shading. I did learn a bit about it last year.

Hope that you enjoyed the Black and White Minimalist Photograph of the Reflection of Two Pigeons above :)

Minimalism as Parts of the Whole

This image is from the "Taruveda" Cafe in Jaipur. I frequently visit different Coffee outlets in town and Taruveda is one place that I really like.

I likes the vibes there, artsy and spiritual. When you enter, you also have a Buddha Statue at the stairs and inside you have a lot of work created by the local artists on display. The artists work primarily consists of home decor and paintings.

I usually take the balcony seat as from there I can see the sun going down. No, I do not take the seat to shoot the sunset. I like the rising sun instead.

So one Sunday, I was at Taruveda Cafe sitting at my balcony seat with my Camera. I ordered a Cold Coffee and some Garlic Pizza Bread. I love Garlic and yes Garlic deserves a capital "G" whereas sunset doesn't deserve a capital "S" for I don't like things that are nearing their end.

I was having a hard day as it was a Sunday and that's my photo shooting day. I had not got any worthwhile shot since morning.

I have this habit of picking up my camera and pointing it randomly at places looking through the viewfinder.

When I was just about to keep my Camera down and put the lend lid back on the lens, I got a glimpse of this Twisted Blue Straw popping out from my Empty Cold Coffee Glass.

Yes, it was Blue and that caught my attention. What also caught my eye were the curls/ curves or the twirl or twist in the straw, whatever you may call it.

So, once the Twisted Coffee Glass Straw got my attention, I decided to click some shots. I quickly remembered the "Parts of the Whole Minimalism Type" from the Minimalist Photography classifications and tried to incorporate that in my Shot.

To execute "Parts of the Whole Minimalism", I shot only the top rim of the Coffee Glass (a part of the whole), with the straw going to the top left on the frame. Later, during editing I converted the photo into black and white. PS: even the straw is not shown completely, so that is also a "Part of the Whole".

Parts of the Whole Minimalism creates a sense of Mystery and make the viewer complete the Subject/Object in his/her imagination. That's the beauty of this Type of Minimalism.

b) The overhead Sun was creating long shadow Lines from these bars as well.

I shooting in the landscape or horizontal mode and the photos that were coming out were full of clutter.

So I decided to shoot this in the Vertical mode or the portrait mode. That helped me to do away with a lot of clutter and I could now also add some Negative Space.

Another challenge was how to apply the Rule of Thirds.

I pushed myself further away from the wall, that created some distance and made the bars appear smaller in size, adding to the Minimalism feel.

Then, I placed the One Set of the Random Iron Bars arrangement along with it shadows, at the bottom of the frame applying the Rule of Thirds

Later, I added a complimentary subject to the frame, i.e the shadows of the other set of Raw Iron Bar arrangement, just above my primary subject at the bottom.

By Not including the Actual Raw Iron bar set on the top, rather including just its shadows, I left a lot of room for imagination for the viewer. He will look at the bars at the Bottom of the frame and try and imagine a similar set of bars on top of the frame, creating the very long shadow lines.

Minimalism as Simple Geometry

This Sunday I was invited by my photographer friend Manav, to Jawahar Kala Kendra for a Photowalk.

Initially I refused, because I had already taken many shots at that place. But because I was feeling tired to go out to a far off place, I agreed.

When I reached Jawahar Kala Kendra, my friend was already sitting with another acquaintance enjoying a cup of coffee.

Before I greeted and joined him, I took about 15 minutes of solo time searching for subjects.

It was a challenge for me, as I had already shot most part of the building. After 10 minutes I realized that I could not find anything worthwhile to frame.

So I tried going in for "creating my own subject" via "visual layering" or "overlapping of surfaces" method. Never heard of these terms before? Never mind, these are my own terms.

I stood right under the structure that had two identical floors with attached balconies, one to my left and one to my right. I started to look up and I kept moving to my right until I had Two Triangles being made by the cut/opening in the wall structure of the floor on the right.

Now, Lets look at the lines on the left. These lines were created by a similar opening in the wall of the floor on the left. If I had moved forward, then Two more similar Triangles would have been created.

Well, I let these lines just take their place in the frame. Didn't fiddle much there.

I basically worked on the size and placement of the Two Triangles on the right, primarily by my physical movement. My movement included all four ways i.e forward, backwards, to my left and to my right.

After about 4 shots, I got the frame that I wanted.

The Photo falls under the Minimalism Type: Simple Geometry. The Simple Geometric shapes being Triangles and Lines.

Minimalism as Less Elements

Although I wanted a Man to pass by the Zebra Crossing with an Umbrella in his hand during a rain shower, instead I was happy to keep this shot of a Man riding the bicycle.

Monsoons have arrived in India early and I had already planned to take a few shots of people walking in the rain with an umbrella in their hands.

Therefore, I first looked for a Coffee Shop at the first floor of a building. So that I can shoot these people "Top-down" from height.

Soon, I found such a Coffee Shop and it was quite near to my office.

In the morning, it was cloudy and so I decided to take my camera with me to work. I planned that I would sneak out of my office (not photography related) for about an hour, shoot and get back.

I even had my own umbrella ready, in case it started to rain before I reached that Coffee Shop.

The time was 4 pm and that's exactly the time I take a break from work for about 45 minutes to have my coffee in peace everyday. I walked out from my office. It had started to drizzle a bit and I was OK to walk in that.

I reached the Coffee Shop and ordered my Coffee. I told the waiter to deliver my order to the first floor where I would be taking a seat.

This Coffee Shop has huge glass windows. Through one of the windows, I could see a traffic signal and the Zebra Crossing near it.

I Was on my 50mm prime lens and my Crop Sensor Canon 600D Camera.

I was still waiting for it to rain heavily. But the opposite happened instead. It stopped drizzling. So I thought let me just wait a little.

But to my surprise, I saw the clouds disperse.

I told myself never mind, you can click those umbrella shots some other day.

I started to practice framing for my next visit to the Coffee Shop. In one of my practice frames, I placed these Zebra Lines diagonally, just as you see in the photograph above.

I was pretty happy with the angle, the distance. I clicked a few empty frames with just the zebra lines in it.

Later I waited for unique subjects to pass by. The most common subjects passing by frequently were Cars, Bikes, some Tuk-tuks and of course people walking by.

A lot of Bicycles also passed by. Since I have a thing for bicycles, I decided to use that as a subject in my shot. I was just practicing.

In one of my shots, I happen to get this man riding the bicycle on the bottom right of the frame. He was exactly on the rule of thirds area of the frame. I also avoided the street traffic here. So, No clutter as well.

I told myself, Yes, you got one. This is very Minimalistic.

But again this shot wasn't my first priority, as I told you before.

This photograph, made it to the blog post only when:

a) I converted the it into black and white and

b) created a silhouette of the man by adjusting "Levels" in editing.

Now, the man is neither too close nor too far in distance. The overall size of the mans shape is also not too big or small enough.

The original shot was taken colored. And the shot was falling under the Street Photography category and not Minimalism as Such.

On the other hand. If the shot stayed colored, but the Distance in the shot was more or the man on his bicycle looked very small in the frame, then even the colored photograph would have fallen into the Minimalism Category (would still have been street photography as well though).

I hope you got the point I am trying to make.

I had no idea that I would be writing a Maximalist Blog Post like this to explain this Minimalist Photograph. Anyways let me stop right here and take your leave.

Minimalism as in Repeating Shapes

This shot falls under the Minimalism as in Repeating Shapes Category. What we have here, is a repetition pattern created by the Windows of the rooms of a hotel in Jaipur.

I have purposefully placed the Green Tree on the bottom left corner of the frame, so as to break the Pattern of Repetition. Without the Green Tree, the shot would be too vanilla, at least for me.

I shot this from an over-bridge, in-case you were wondering from where I got the height in the frame. Its the result of the over-bridge elevation, that I am looking-up but yet my view is kind of flattish or parallel to the ground.

Other than the height, the 100 mm Macro Lens helped me to shoot this comfortably from a distance.

Hope that you enjoyed the shot and the Minimalist explanation ;)

Stay tuned for more.

*In-case you haven't noticed. My Sales Store is now loaded with about 450 photos :)

Minimalism as Less Elements

My posting schedule seems to be as random as the shape of the clouds in the sky. I believe those who have subscribed to my blog posts via e-mail must be getting my mails when they don't expect and vice-versa.

Never mind, since I am yet not full-time into photography, my posting schedule is going to be the same.

So you must be wondering what made me post today, If you were not wondering, still no problem I'd still tell you ;)

I open my laptop less often these days. I just came here today to randomly check my mails and some other social profiles. Usually I am glued to my phone for the same. So, today was different.

Since I was getting bored I got my ear phones on and started listening to a latest Bollywood romantic song "Mai Phir Bhi Tumko Chahunga" (in english "I'd still love you",) from the new Bollywood movie Half-Girlfriend.

While I was doing that, I thought why not open my Minimalist Photography Folder and check the edited pictures in it. The above photograph has been edited about 4 months back but I had still not posted it.

Something stopped me every-time I tried to post. While I began writing this post, I observed the Photograph carefully and then I realized it actually relates to the song I am listening to.

So, my sub-conscious mind made me select this photograph by correlating the words of the song to it. The song's lyrics are "I'd still love you" the rest of the assumption in general is "no matter what"... So, "I'd still love you, no matter what".

If we consider the stem of the plant with leaves, as a person who was in love but got heart-broken. The same is represented here by both The Missing Leaves and the Lack of Color in the Photograph ie. it being Black and White.

And for a moment it appeared to me that this person is singing this song "I'd still love you, no matter what" (despite being broken, despite The Missing Leaves.)

You might think I am crazy but for me this is the plus side of being a Minimalist Photographer. My sense of observation has increased a lot and I am able to now co-relate things.

Anyways, lets take a look at the Composition:

The Composition is quite Simple. Just place the subject in the right, and leave some empty space. That is all. But wait, this is Gray. Gray is challenging to edit. Make sure to adjust the Highlights and Contrast in the right proportion. This took me a very long time to edit, just to get the gray right.